Almost every graphical user interface (GUI) is capable of generating one or more input controls for display to a user. The input controls are typically associated with an application program that is being executed in the computer system. The user can enter one or more values in the input control while working with the application program. The application program can then store the values for future reference or process them, depending on its configuration.
Sometimes the GUI displays several identical input controls. For example, the GUI may display a table in which several instances of a data object are listed. Each of the instances therefore contains identical attributes to which values can be associated, but they do not necessarily contain the same value for the attribute. The GUI contains one input control associated with this specific object attribute for each of the listed instances. Some input controls have predefined alternative input values. Examples include pulldown menus and drop-down list boxes, where the user can use a pointing device to select any listed input value for the control.
The task of selecting and entering the desired input value can be cumbersome. If the user needs to fill in or update several controls in the GUI, the task of going through each one and surveying the available input alternatives to find the appropriate value can be tedious and error-prone. This is particularly inconvenient if each of the input controls has many alternative input values to choose between, because the user then has to scroll through the pulldown menu to the right value for each of the controls.
A version of the customer relationship management (CRM) system available from SAP AG in Walldorf (Baden), Germany, has been provided with a feature by which the user can select individual items in a list and thereafter open a new window to perform operations of assigning values to input controls in the selected items. However, the CRM solution may require the user to select, in the separate window, both the input control (from those available) and the value to be assigned. Moreover, no option for automatically making the value assignment is provided.